When a round of golf has real meaning

Nation & World

U.S. ARMY CAMP BONIFAS, South Korea -- You stand atop an elevated tee box on the first and only hole of the world's most dangerous golf course.

And you consider your chances.

This deadly little par 3 measures 192 yards but plays more like 250 in the face of the vicious winds that often blow out of North Korea across an exclusive piece of real estate called the DMZ, just a few yards away.

Underneath your feet and off to the right are bunkers. The military kind. To the left, over an 18-foot-high security fence topped by concertina wire, are hazards that make high rough, deep water and dense woods seem like child's play.

Try countless unexploded mines -- the very definition of out-of-bounds.

A sign nearby drives the point home: "Danger. Do not retrieve balls from the rough. Live mine fields."

"Oh, dear Lord," moans one of your two playing partners, Army Sgt. Mikel Thurman. "You know what would make this play easier? Let's go get the keys and open the bar."

The course is called Camp Bonifas. It's named in honor of Capt. Arthur Bonifas, who was axed to death by North Korean soldiers in 1976 during a disagreement over a tree-pruning project.

The course provides a much-needed emotional outlet for the 50 U.S. soldiers stationed here at a lonely outpost without theaters or restaurants. "It's like a Zen garden where we hit little white balls," says Thurman, 41, an Army brat who was born in Seoul.

When they built the course, commanders figured that if they couldn't fit in all 18 holes in the compact camp, they'd compensate by making it difficult. They'd match their skills against one tough little customer they wouldn't soon forget.

The result is a layout that slices through dense rows of trees, along a fairway that's a mere 40 yards wide.

"Most golf holes would get boring if you played them again and again," says Sgt. James Meisenheimer, a 23-year-old Kansas City native. "This one doesn't."

There's no attitude here at Camp Bonifas. Meisenheimer, a tough but polite kid who has spent 15 months in Afghanistan and will become a Green Beret in another year, plays his rounds U.S. Army-style: in combat boots and fatigues.

Some guys carry their military side arms, giving new meaning to playing a "round" of golf.

The green is a real piece of work. A recent monsoon flooded the ground underneath. Now the big sheet of Astroturf doesn't sit right and covers half the cup, which is made from an old piece of PVC pipe that sticks out of the ground, repelling balls. Thurman whacks a putt. "That's not gonna stop," Meisenheimer says as the ball rolls off the green.

When it's over, when the scores are tallied, Meisenheimer says. "You did real well."

But you figure you did even better. You took a good walk, unspoiled by penalty strokes and land mines.